If you’ve ever experienced the latter months of a pregnancy you probably know what I mean by “nesting.” I define it as an uncontrollable and sometimes illogical drive to accomplish certain tasks before baby arrives, even if said tasks will in no way make a difference to the baby’s life. Some moms feel the urge to clean everything in sight. Some feel the need to cook mass quantities of food to stock the freezer. While these things are helpful and we can all agree that cooking and cleaning are great things to do before baby comes, the urgencya mom can feel to get these done borders psychotic. I’d love for you to comment and tell me some of the ways you nested. Especially some of the more unique tasks you felt you HAD to get done and how urgently you felt that need!

I am in a state of nesting at the moment. I haven’t mentioned here on my blog that Matt was coming home early for security reasons, but my state of mind is most definitely in the “nesting” category. I have been cleaning and doing odd-jobs around the house for a few weeks. It’s very much like pregnancy: “I know this will end (baby will come/hubby will return) but I don’t know the exact date.” For this reason, sometimes I’d find myself needing to sleep instead of work. I wanted to work, but the mental exhaustion would take its toll and I’d need a nap. RIGHT THEN. A “no functioning without it” kind of thing. (Not at all unlike pregnancy.)

Today, Tuesday the 29th of June, I can say with some certainty, that I will see Matt tonight. (Although, it could be after midnight making it, technically, “tomorrow.”) Two months before his original return date! In some ways I’m excited. In other ways, I’m cautious because all it takes is an issue with a plane and it’s delayed a day, or four. (Not at all unlike pregnancy.) The only difference is that over the past few weeks, there was always a true possibility of it being delayed for months… that’s the most stressful part. The date could always be put back to its original date, and for that, I certainly couldn’t complain, but then, it has been known to be pushed even farther to the right by several months. Allowing myself to get my hopes up has been very difficult. Add to all of this we’re trying to surprise the boys! It’s hard enough to endure the roller-coaster by myself. If the date were to be pushed back to October, I could handle the disappointment, but to see the boys get so excited about his return only to have them change it… I couldn’t handle that. And so I have done everything in my power to keep this a surprise! We’re at 5 hours out and so far so good! I have concocted a fairly sturdy story and I think we’ll make it!

Sunday I felt the urge to clean both of our cars, fill them with gas, and clean the garage. But first, I needed a nap. It was a productive day, with some soccer practice mixed in there. Yesterday I cut the boys’ hair, got my hair cut and more that I don’t recall at the moment. Today I charged the cameras, cleaned more of the house, ran a few errands, had his phone turned back on, emptied out our shredded paper container, vacuumed dust from the corners of each room, vacuumed the doors, (YES, the doors), swept and mopped the entire downstairs, washed any item of clothing I thought might be dirty including a pile that I’m somewhat sure might have been clean… {I don’t do the boys’ laundry so I’m not really sure…}, cleaned our porch furniture, rescued all toys from under the couches… and generally tried to keep the house (and my mental state) from deteriorating. Nesting is over!

Some of jobs over the past few weeks have been to dust every nook and cranny of this house; clean the fridge; change the light in the garage door opener; wax the floors; clean the baseboards; things that need to happen on an occasional basis anyway, but because of the upcoming reunion, I felt the urge to get them done NOW!

I Googled a few articles on nesting and found some really great stories. Because of the ads surrounding the articles, I won’t add any links here, as I’ll spare your eyes the stuff I had to see, but some were as interesting as bleaching the garage floor and scrubbing ceilings! Do you have any stories of nesting? Either from a pregnancy or the return of your military member?

Parker didn’t nap today but fell asleep watching TV… I’m letting him get some rest. As I post this (at approximately 5:50 PM) my bigs are at a neighbor’s eating pizza because I didn’t want to dirty a single dish. Parker’s sleeping, and I’m sitting here updating our blog. I feel it’s safe to do so since the US Army has already posted publicly about the return! You can read that article here!!

7 Responses to Nesting of a different sort.

So thrilled for you and the boys! It is so exciting… even I was very excited about it today and watched the clock. Then, about 10:30 I told Ralph that Matt should be landing any moment. How funny is that? Haven’t even met you all personally, but was just as excited as if we were related! So thankful is he back home now. <3

I am SO SO SO happy for you!!!
I must say that I didn’t feel like I ever nested. I made what was going to be 10 frozen meals but when I printed out the ingredients list it turned into 20… I did that about a month before Lydia arrived, and the only other thing that crossed my mind was the night before she arrived I started to clean a little, not a lot but I thought to myself… wow, this is what nesting is I guess…

So happy to hear he is home now! I have been watching Facebook closely for updates! My nesting did not come until my mom got here a few weeks before Peter was born (nesting could not really happen with Anna around). My strangest things for nesting were making sure we planted wild flowers and that the garage was cleaned out and organized! I am jealous of your ability to get so much done in your nesting spell…maybe one day my floors will be clean for more than two minutes.

Not likely. Floors are still something that need attention all day long! Here in TX the grass is weird and there are always dead pieces that come in on our shoes. We have grass on our kitchen floors all the time.

We sweep in the morning before school and if it gets really bad, I’ll have someone do it again during the day, but usually, I just let it go. Most of the time, it’s just grass!

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